A man on trial in France for drugging his wife and inviting dozens of men to rape her over a decade told a criminal psychologist that his wife was to blame for his actions because she wouldn't go swinging with him.
READ MORE:He was a bit of a loudmouth with a tendency to make up stories, and his fondness for gambling and living beyond his means plunged his family into a financial mess.
Pelicot, a 71-year-old retired electrician, oversaw a near-decade-long campaign of abuse against his wife Gisele between 2011 and 2020 in which he systematically drugged his wife unconscious and invited dozens of strangers to their family home to rape her on camera - sometimes joining the attacks himself.
His older brother said that they were 'very close' as children, sharing the same room for 15 years and even the same bed at times. Perhaps it was growing up in this carefree rural idyll that inspired an overactive imagination in Dominique, who had a tendency for making up stories. What's more, he cast doubt on his brother's story entirely, saying that their mother had made inquiries and found that there were only women on duty that night.
After a stint in real estate, Dominique became a technical sales agent for fire alarms and computer equipment, and while working at one of these companies he met Gisele in 1971. It's believed that they maintained their relationship privately, and the couple married again in 2007. However, while he knew his younger sibling wasn't perfect, his brother was as shocked as everyone else when he was arrested and his horrific crimes came to light.'It's not easy. I had to face the facts: I lost my little brother,' he said.
Her next words, however, bring a dramatic change in tone: 'I hate you. Have you always been unhinged? And we would have seen nothing? Can we miss a father? But who are you really?' If they thought, perhaps, that their father spent rather too much time on his computer, what nobody had any inkling of was the depravity of his online activities.
In her 2022 book entitled 'And I Stopped Calling You Papa', published under the pen name Caroline Darian, Dominique's estranged daughter described him as a considerate, kind man who was heavily involved in her youth. 'I think of us as happy, I thought my parents were,' she said in her 2002 book, entitled 'And I Stopped Calling You Papa', published under the pen name Caroline Darian.
'Sometimes a feeling of abandonment arises. It invades me, crushes me. Dad, why are you so far away from us? I thought I had mourned my father. The truth is that this trial awakens the little girl in me. The one who has not yet succeeded in killing the paternal image. Money hadn't always been easy to come by - the 2008 financial crash ruining Dominique's foray into the world of real estate and attempts at entrepreneurship - but Gisele's stable income meant they'd saved enough to rent a lovely bungalow with a pool and a lush garden.
Gisele began complaining of symptoms of fogginess and disorientation, and on several occasions suffered memory loss so severe that she began to suspect Alzheimer's disease. All 51 men stand accused of aggravated rape - the largest number of defendants to have been tried together in recent years anywhere in France.
A court drawing shows Madame Pelicot taking the stand, facing her husband and the 50 others accused of raping herThe son of Gisele Pelicot, Florian and her daughter Caroline Peyronnet leave the criminal court in Avignon, France, 05 September 2024 'In reality the cocktail of drugs, poured into her glass of rosé, was beginning to take effect,' Caroline said.
Despite the nasty accusation and mounting evidence something was wrong, the loving wife remained unaware that her husband had anything to do with her malaise. That realisation, of course, brought her entire world and that of her cherished family crashing down. 'I had to tell my children that their father was in custody. I called my son-in-law and told my daughter and told them: ''He raped me''. Then I heard my daughter screaming a deep cry that I cannot get out of my head.' evening, the children rang all the time saying ''don't disappear''... they were worried I might die.'
'She says she has seen photos of what happened to her and that the police want to show her videos of what happened. Gisele Pelicot's daughter Caroline enters the court room to give evidence against her dad Dominque Pelicot. Pictured: Artist drawing from inside the court of Caroline in the dockBut another 35 men – from all walks of life – deny that they forced themselves on Madame Pelicot while she was unconscious, claiming that she in some way consented.
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